


Filthy Pride

by 2MusicLover2



Category: Bandom, Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Angst, Post-Split, Song fic, it depends on how you want to view it, kinda Ryden but not really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-25
Updated: 2019-07-25
Packaged: 2020-07-19 15:33:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19976398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/2MusicLover2/pseuds/2MusicLover2
Summary: A post-split Panic! thing I wrote based on the song Filthy Pride by Social Repose. It's not really a Ryden thing but I guess you can take it that way if you want.





	Filthy Pride

_ Heavy-handed, rapid fire _

Whenever the tip of your pen hit that page it was like it had landed in freshly poured cement that dried upon contact with the ink. The only difference was that instead of being stuck in one spot, it would glide effortlessly across the surface of the paper, trails of ink left behind in its wake. No one could get you to stop until you were done and nothing could slow down the words flowing from your brain to be written across the white expanse in black ink.

_ Infatuation with my filthy pride _

We both wrote like that. Maybe that’s why it all turned to shit in the end. We were too similar. We both wanted our words to be what we sang over each other's words.

_ To a senseless beating, crippled and barely breathing _

It got to the point that we tore apart each other's lyrics. Picked at each and every word, saying everything that was wrong with it until we were both left with mangled and bloodied songs, feeling half-dead ourselves. I don’t know what I was thinking. I loved your words. Every last one of them.

_ I tore off my skin, I’ll hang from this noose _

My murdering of your words was how I killed myself.

_ This is what happens when I show you my demons _

Maybe I had brought this gory end on myself, though. Maybe it’s all my fault. I opened up to you. No. We opened up to each other. And all that came of it was this. This beautiful, deadly mess.

_ Repeating the cycle that turns love into indifference _

I’d do it all again. Because no matter how mutilated and broken we are when we come out of this, that time together is time I wouldn’t dare give up. If you would let me, I would make our band whole again, even though it would probably end even worse than before.

_ When I chase after affection, it won’t chase after me _

You won’t let me do that, though. I can tell. Whenever I see you, or a video of you, or even a picture of you, I see how much you want it. But you won’t let me. We both want this so bad, but you won’t let it happen. Why won’t you let it happen?

_ I get confused on why we always part so violently _

And I don’t know why it ended the way it did. We were amazing together. But the ending was so ugly. 

_ But honestly _

I know nothing could have kept it from happening.

_ The day I met you _

That first time we had band practice together, that first time our eyes met, that first time we were a band, the four of us, Spencer, Brent, you, and I, that was the beginning.

_ I started dying _

It was the beginning of our destruction. The second the four of us had become a band was the second we started to tear ourselves apart.

_ Oh, I should have known a little better _

You and I have both had plenty of experiences in our lives that should have let us know that it was wrong. It wouldn’t stay. We couldn’t be a band. It was going to end and there was nothing to stop it, nothing to slow it down.

_ Good things never last forever _

Yet we kept going. Jon replaced Brent and we kept going. You and I kept going. We started the second album and the death of Panic! quickened. The heartbeat of the band slowed down at a faster rate than before.

_ Oh, my heart in repose _

Now that you’re not with me my heart is barely beating. It’s only doing what it needs to keep me alive.

_ I need you the most _

Forget the band, I am dead without you.

_ Oh, feed me to the wolves _

Everything we did just tore me apart more. I know it did the same to you. There was no way that either of us could have come out of that in any better shape than we did. Mangled and bloody is the only way we could have ever ended. It’s like we were obsessed with destroying ourselves. We wouldn’t be satisfied unless we had completely defaced and ruined ourselves.

_ Like I don’t have a pulse _

We were sabotaging ourselves. Sabotaging each other. Sabotaging us together. All as if we didn’t care that it was killing us. Maybe we don’t. Maybe that’s the point. To slowly incapacitate ourselves and rip each other apart until there was nothing left of us.

_ Oh, ‘cause the day you say “no” _

All until that day when our band split in half. That’s when it all finally ended.

_ I started dying _

But it only ended because there was nothing left of it to shred to pieces. That was the day I finally noticed all of the injuries we had inflicted upon me. The pain finally started to affect me and I could do nothing but curl up and let myself die.

_ Mindless madness, I am clueless _

I don’t even think about it. I just do it. It’s become second nature for me to just point out all of the flaws in everything you do. At first, I might have been joking, but somewhere along the line, it became real and I don’t know when. It was probably while we were recording the second album. Not  _ Pretty. Odd. _ , but  _ Cricket & Clover _ . I don’t remember much of that time. We were all too high.

_ Thoughtless choices, I ruin myself _

Still, I don’t think about it. Except, this time, it’s not us, it’s just me. We obliterated every last thought of ‘us’ so now I’m left to tear myself apart.

_ Tear into me like an unknown disease _

Nothing will stop it. We have yet to discover the cure. We have yet to discover the cause. We don’t even know what it is. All we know is that it destroys us, bringing us to our knees, making us beg for mercy even though we know that no one else can keep the harm from coming to us. Even though we know that we are the ones crippling ourselves.

_ Give me your damage, I’m begging you, please _

I’ve realized it’s possible that I want this. If you were to stop then I’d die. I will give anything to have you shatter me the way that you do. Throw whatever kind of destruction you want my way. I’ll take it all. I’ll cherish it with my entire being.

_ She said, “depression isn’t sadness” _

Yet everyone tells me I’m not depressed, only sad. Who wouldn’t be sad in a situation like this? But I’m famous, I have no reason to be depressed. I’ve got money. I have everything anyone could ever want.

_ It’s a certain sense of apathy that hangs directly over me _

I don’t have you. I miss you. Everything else seems insignificant without you. The shadows of our split cover my mind, bathing it in suffocating darkness. Without you, I can’t think of anything other than how much I wish you were here with me.

_ She’ll wrap herself around my neck _

As time goes on, you would think it would get better, but it doesn’t. I’m stuck in this state of mind where nothing matters. It’s killing me almost as much as we did. Breathing is impossible. I’m not sure which is suffocating me more, the lack of you or lack of my attention for everything else.

_ I’m too numb to feel the entropy surrounding me _

Somehow, it’s gotten to the point that I didn’t notice as everything collapsed around me. Then again, that might be something left over from when I still had you. Remember how confused I got at the end? How did I not notice our story was coming to a close, the curtains drawing around us as I kept trying to finish out the act on stage. The lights lifted and the curtains were fully drawn by the time I realized what had happened. We had ended. There was nothing that could have stopped it. Obviously, pretending everything was okay doesn’t work.

_ Because the day I met you _

And now I sit here and ask myself if the curtains ever open?

_ I started dying _

Thinking about it just makes me believe that they never were. I try to make excuses to make myself believe that they were, because I wish. I wish the way we made music together meant the band wouldn’t die until we did. I wish the way the two of us talked meant we would never leave each other. I wish we didn’t take what we had for granted. I wish we weren’t so horrid to each other while we were still you&I. I wish we weren’t even worse to each other now that we’re only you and I, now that we don’t even mention each other, now that I try to keep you out of my thoughts. We can see how well that’s worked out.

_ Oh, I should’ve known a little better _

The band is dead. It started dying with the first words we spoke to each other. Sure, it’s still alive now, but it’s not the same; I need you. We left each other. I can’t change the fact that I’ll probably never see you or talk to you again. Sure, there’s photos and videos of you, or I could go to your concerts, but it’s not the same; I need to see you up close. We took it all for granted. Nothing we ever did together is completely ingrained in my memory anymore. Sure, I remember that last day when that rift formed between us, but it’s not the same; I need memories of the good times between us. We were and are horrid to each other. Every word that spilled out of our mouths was acidic, slowly eating away at us. Sure, not speaking could be seen as nicer than what we had before, but it’s not the same; I’m already damaged and nothing can changed that.

_ Good things never last forever _

We were doomed from the start. The glimmer in your eye and the smile on your lips the first time we met is the only thing my memory can’t seem to taint.

_ Oh, my heart in repose _

Sometimes I wonder if I had died and gone to hell, if this is just Lucifer’s torture for me after everything I had done wrong in my life. The only thing that makes me believe that’s not the truth is the fact that I still have a pulse, however faint it may be.

_ I need you the most _

I’ll die with or without you, but you will be the cause of my death. I need you to keep me alive and I need you to kill me.

_ Oh, feed me to the wolves _

Build me up and rip me to shreds. You’re the only one with the capability to do it. Nothing else can make me live the way you do and nothing else can kill me the way you do. It was always you.

_ Like I don’t have a pulse _

You never cared whether I was dead or alive, you just did whatever you wanted and let whatever happened happen. And now that you’re without me I’m left to pretend it’s all okay, even though I’m just a hollow shell of what I was. You tore out my soul when we parted ways and I’m afraid I won’t ever get it back.

_ Oh, ‘cause the day you said “no” _

Because you refuse to come back to me, and I refuse to let you. Because I refuse to go back to you, and you refuse to let me. We’ll just keep retreating, farther and farther from each other.

_ I started dying _

But the world is round and eventually we’ll retreat right back to each other. We’ll be together again. It kills me every time I think of it. We were always a ticking time bomb and if we ever meet again, it will start its countdown over and blow up again. I think maybe the countdown has already started. It’ll probably explode on impact, when our eyes land on each other.

_ You make me happy _

No matter what, I’ll be your friend. It was never an option to not be friends. You are mine and I am yours and we are us, always and forever. We’ll never grow apart. No matter how it may seem, I feel like we’re closer than ever. We’ve managed to kill each other from a distance. That had to count for something.

_ You’ll make me kill myself _

No matter what, we’ll slaughter each other. It was never an option not to cause this pain. You kill me and I kill you and we sacrifice ourselves to each other, forever and always. We’ll never stop. No matter how close to death we force ourselves, I feel like we will never die. I’ll just suffer until I wish I was dead.

_ I can be happy with you _

If we were together again I could probably learn to live and to enjoy things in life again. You are my happiness, but that was taken away from me.

_ But I can’t be happy if I’m dead _

And then I remember that if we were together again that would probably be the final straw and we’d burn ourselves to ash, leaving nothing to come back from.

_ Oh, I should’ve known a little better _

I never should have agreed to meeting you. Why did I think any good could have come from it? Ever since we met, we were stuck on a plane due to crash and bring us to death. Except the oxygen masks were stuck and everyone aboard was slowly suffocating and panicking the whole way down.

_ Good things never last forever _

And crash we did. In my mind there wasn’t even a fire, there wasn’t enough gas left for that. No, the plane just dug itself into the ground while the sound of twisting metal filled the air and we sat onboard watching as everything around us fell apart. We sat there as we fell apart ourselves.

_ Oh, my heart in repose _

I don’t think we died. No, that would be too final. We’re just stuck in ICU, letting the machines beat what’s left of our heart. Next to our hospital bed is where I spend my days, trying anything to nurse us back to good health. Trying to make us okay again.

_ I need you the most _

But I can’t do this without you. I want to believe that you sit on the other side of that bed doing the same as I because you want this too. I know you do. I think you do.

_ Oh, feed me to the wolves _

For all I know you could be on the other side of that bed, just doing the opposite of me. Anything I do to bring us back, you could be offsetting it by doing something to cripple us further.

_ Like I don’t have a pulse _

Or the plug has already been pulled and I’m left here pretending there’s still something left, still stuck in denial. Did you pull it? Did someone else? Did I?

_ Oh, ‘cause the day you said “no” _

Everyone did. Our hands wrapped around each other’s and we stopped our heart from beating while everyone else held a pillow over our face just in case. We looked straight into each other’s eyes and pulled that cord out of the wall. The last thing we did together.

_ I felt alive _

And that’s the last time I truly remember feeling any emotion. Our eyes met and I thought maybe we could make this work as something else. Then you walked away. So I turned around and did the same.

**Author's Note:**

> For the record, I don't ship Ryden. Well, not in the sense that I'm gonna think about them sleeping together. Ryan is my "uncle", so that would be weird. I do think there could have been some feelings there though, especially on Brendon's end, which is why I wrote this in a way that doesn't explicitly say whether it happened or not. But, I got this idea while listening to this song and once I get an idea, it doesn't stop bothering me until I go through with it.
> 
> I also didn't really make the point of view a certain person either. That's mainly just because I couldn't decide whose point of view I wanted it to be in.
> 
> Writing that made me really upset and now I'm listening to Live in Denver and crying. Good times.


End file.
